Two neonates with occipital encephalocele showed spikes and paroxysmal electrical activity in the aberrant brain tissue of the sacs. One child survived to 8 years while the other died at 2 months of age.
Visual evoked responses over the sac could be obtained at birth in one child, who became blind. Whether or not the blindness was caused by the resection at age 1 year could not be proved. The second child had no functional pathways open to the visual cortex of the herniated, microgyric, posterior portion of the right hemisphere. Furthermore, paroxysmal electrical discharges originating in the aberrant brain tissue did not cause clinical seizures presumably because of lack of connections from encephalocele to intracranial brain.